Vegan Solutions For Land & Sea

You know what people get really pissed off about? Shark finning, the removal of fins from sharks, with the discarding of the carcass back into the sea. People love to hate shark finning — rightly so, seeing as how it’s both inefficient, wasteful, and cruel. But do you know what causes more shark deaths annually than shark finning? Fishing. Yep, just plain old fishing. Conscious-eaters hail fish as a golden source of lean protein, (wrongly) seen as more humane and healthier than farmed animals on land, but approximately 60 million sharks a year are removed from the oceans and killed just as by-catch from standard fishing practices. In our second installment of The Earthix Podcast, we talk about the extreme number of accidental and purposeful shark deaths in our oceans. Estimates range anywhere between 63 million to 273 million — a number so high it would be approximated to wiping out 91% of the U.S. human population every single year. We also explore why the idea of ‘responsible management’ of this problem just doesn’t cut it.

Photo by Endre Vestvik

The Bushmeat Crisis is what Jane Goodall, and many known experts, call “the most significant and immediate threat to wildlife populations in Africa today”. It’s a horrific crisis, driven by many forces, affecting many populations of both people and non-human animals.

For those that aren’t aware, in Africa the forest is referred to as ‘the bush’, so Bushmeat is meat that is sourced — aka illegally hunted — from the forests. Usually the prime targets are primates, specifically endangered species like gorillas and apes.

It’s a complicated problem, one that involves the illegal involvement of logging/mining industries, extremely impoverished human populations, and a perpetual cycle of primate & human disease. Obviously, people are outraged at the Bushmeat Crisis, as we all should be; it’s devastating news for not only human health and orphaned victims of the hunting, but could very realistically wipe out the African primate population within 50 years.

In this podcast, we address the issues, the driving forces behind them, and some hopeful solutions that could realistically be implemented to turn the situation around.

At Earthix, we know the world’s problems are complex issues. We’re outraged, but we also see the importance of offering tangible solutions. Please listen to our second Earthix Podcast, and let’s start a damn discussion.

We’d like to extend a huge thanks to Conor Porter and his team at Sparrow Insight for their diligent hours of sound editing, for designing and creating the Earthix podcast artwork, and for publishing the podcast on all its platforms. We are so thankful to have Sparrow Insight as a resource!